Page 10 of Kat Bethel

Another headstone. This was a cemetery. No more than a couple yards away from where those teens slept.

Their night was probably hell.

The whispering hushed in a way that made my stomach drop. My flashlight flickered out as if it had been silenced too…

“Come on.” I slapped the side of the light. “Get your shit together.”

The last of the light vanished as the sun finished setting, shrouding me in complete darkness.

Oh, fuck.

Chapter 5:

Myflashlightcamebackon, but I decided it was best to go back to my tent. The atmosphere changed like someone flipped a switch. There wasn’t one thing watching me anymore. The space felt occupied now. The air crackled with energy, lots of it.

I got a fire going in the teens’ old makeshift pit and put down a thin salt circle around my camp. The fire held the bulk of the spiritual energy back, but shadows moved all around me.

I crawled into my tent and sleeping bag, knowing that I should get rest while I could. The witching hour would be when things cranked up.

The second I stopped moving William came to my mind, making tears prick my eyes again.What did he want?

Part of me longed to prove my worth to him, but that was desperation to be accepted and I knew it. So I closed my eyes, pretending that none of the tears escaped.

Why couldn’t anyone give me forever?

That’s not true. Esme and Willow were always with me, even when they weren’t. I let out a breath, resting heavier on that bond than what was healthy.

But that would have to be a problem for future-me. Today I had enough battles to fight.

The sensation of a gentle caress brushed under my eyes.

I sat straight up, my heart pounding out of my chest. My cheeks were wet as if I’d been sobbing. I scrambled out of the tent and found that the fire had almost died.

I’d fallen asleep, for a long time.

I clicked my watch to find it was three in the morning. The witching hour. I fed the fire. The response was almost immediate. The fire whooshed up and filled the area with dim light.

A scream echoed off the trees and filled the air. My eyes went to the area the sound came from and found multiple figures dressed like it was the 1800s, walking around like it was a normal day in the village.

Each one was a faded light gray that seemed to vanish and reappear as if they were on a loop, stuck on a track they couldn’t get off of.

Like they were nothing more than echoes of what once was.

Ghosts.

I checked the other side of the settlement to find the same thing. The spirits walked around with stony faces that said they’d seen too much and didn’t dare hope things would get better.

More screams in the distance, but the other ghosts didn’t respond. This was their normal.

A ghost nearby stopped in her tracks, grabbed her face and screamed like she was on fire. She climbed to the top of a rock, tossed a rope over something that didn’t exist anymore, and put the noose around her neck.

The man who’d been escorting her begged wordlessly for her to stop. His hands shaking in her direction, but she didn’t even blink when she jumped off the rock. He slumped with defeat, before joining her.

Their spirits hanged eerily as the rest of the town folk carried on, not sparing them a glance.

A gasp escaped me before I could smother it behind my hands.

Every ghost halted and their eyes tiredly slid to me. Only to grow wide with horror a few seconds later.